We're Desperate. Get Used to It.

2006-10-05T08:47:00.000-07:00

Peter Norman died yesterday. He was the Australian runner who stood with Tommie Smith and John Carlos while they made their famous protest during the Olympics.

There's a really fascinating story and obit from The Washington Post that you can read here:

Link.

Aside, the new Subtle album is fucking nuts, and you should all download/steal/purchase it somewhere.

Interview with Erase Errata's Jenny Hoyston

2006-09-19T02:10:00.000-07:00

I'm typing this out here because my own computer is broken, so this seems the most logical space. All ums, likes, you knows, speaking over each other and ill-formed sentences are intact. Also I can't make out what my tape says half the time due to my incredibly ghetto fly-by-night recording setup.

After a few false starts (the band was lost in Baltimore) Jenny returned my phone call this Sunday, and we talked.

Hi.

Christopher?

Yeah, can you hear me now?

Hey, yeah, totally, I can hear you well now.

Sorry about that. Did you find the -

Are you calling from ... are you calling from Washington?

YEah, I'm calling from Olympia actually.

That's what I thought, I saw the 360 number and I was like "is that from Olympia, or is that someone I know?" (Laughs. Pause.) Um, cool.

Yeah, um, yeah I moved here about three years ago - I'm actually from New Jersey, originally, but uh, I went to school at Evergreen so, I decided to stick around. (Pause) So, uh -

I love that college, it's so pretty.

Yeah, it's a really beautiful area. Um. I had a really good experience there. Uh, I'm gonna turn on the tape recorder now, is that okay?

What's that?

I'm gonna turn on the tape recorder now?

Oh sure, sure. Go for it.

Okay, by the way I have a habit of talking really fast, and people can't understand me so, if I do that, just go ahead and let me know, I can slow down.

Okay, sure.

So did you guys find the place okay, in Baltimore?

Did we what? Oh yeah, yeah. Perfect.

Um, how long have you guys been on tour.

Uh, this is the third week.

Okay, uh, are people responding to the new material well?

Quite well.

Okay, um, are you guys playing any of the material um, from when Sara (Jaffe) was playing guitar, or are you guys just doing the newer stuff, or what?

Uh, we usually try to play a song or two from when Sara played guitar. I don't know her parts necessarily so I usually just kind of mess around. (laughs) But yeah, you know, we want to play some of our old songs, since, y'know, people want to hear them.

Okay, um, the two of you have such drastically different styles, where did you learn, to play - um, I guess my question is where did you learn to play guitar, and have you played in bands before now, or, is this a new thing for you?

Yeah. Yeah, I've actually been playing guitar about four times as long as Sara has.

Really?

So it's kinda funny. Her style sort of evolved from, uh, one place, I think, and then mine is one of a more traditional [place], but yeah I've been playing guitar since I was seven and I'm thirty-four now.

Hmm, that's interesting. Did you play in any bands or anything or ...?

(A beat) Um, yeah, I liked a lot of - I played a lot of folk music and country music and stuff growing up. And I guess you can kinda hear some of that coming out of the new songs.

It does sound a bit more, uh, like, traditional chords, kinda, but I wouldn't necessarily say it was folk or country, though. That's kinda interesting.

Yeah, I do some country riffs on like, "Dust" and some of the other songs, but, they're kinda, they're pretty lapsed I guess.

Yeah. If anything it seems kinda like, I don't know, more riff heavy or something. I don't know.

Yeah.

I mean, I don't know, that's just how it seems to me. So, uh, aside from, I mean, obviously Sara left the band, but um, was there more of a conscious decision to change your sound for the new record, or was it just that, you play -

No not at all, it's just kind of happened from, from ... just from the way we play together. Definitely nothing conscious. There's really not any conscious anything even in the band's formation, so (it's the) "we've kinda kept this up, let's see what happens when we all start playing" mentality.

Hmm. Uh, in your bio it kinda sounds like it was a bit of a struggle to come up with a new sound after Sara left. Um, did you guys ever feel like packing it in or, or, what really .. what

(Laughs) Well, we didn't really have too much of a trouble coming up with a new sound, as much as we, we kind of, we kinda -- when Sara left and we needed to write completely new material, it, it gave us this time situation, and unfortunately, we're all, you know, full time outside of the band, and have these drastically different work schedules. There was a time, when we had a, um, when we had a four piece and every once in a while we would write a new song, but when it came down to, "oh no, we actually need to write a whole hour-long set," it took a couple years.

Yeah.

Uh, and then of course there's the glory of recording, and then the album usually comes out a year later (laughs). So, yeah, it took us a couple of years to actually get another album's worth of material, cus, honestly, between our job schedules we get to rehearse maybe once every month, or less.

Really?

Yes.

Wow, um, what do you guys when you're not in Erase Errata?

Ellie works at a non-profit program that um, focuses - does a lot of advocacy for people who are in prison and um works a lot for children of people who are incarcerated.

Hm.

Um, Bianca works at, like a, artsy video store, and I'm a sound engineer for a club in San Francisco.

Cool.

So Ellie's got the traditional 9-5 worday, um, hours, and Bianca and I work opposite nights, basically.

Really.

So whenever we want to get together and rehearse, somebody's gotta take off, so we kinda flip a coin every month to see who it's going to be.

Yeah.

Um, but that's been the great thing about tour, and it's just, it's fucking amazing because we all get to be together, y'know, just like jam together, just like really get, y'know kinda a cohesive unit, again, like we used to, because when Sara was in the band we were touring so much that we weren't really working that much, or, working as much, and so we just have a lot of time to really play together, and to, you know, the band is (unintelligble).

Yeah. Is that, um, is that a more recent development? Because it sounds like on your records, you guys like, I mean, there's so many shifts and changes and stuff, like you guys sound really tight, like, if like, um, if you guys practice just once a month, I mean that's, that's sort of incredible. Is that always the way it's been, or did you used to practice more often or ...?

Uh, we used to, we used to have different schedules. I think I kinda fell into my employment, becase of - I used to work a 9 to 5 accounting job when we first started the ban, so we were, we were able to practice a lot more, uh, back then, but then I had to leave that job to do - we toured straight for a couple of years.

Yeah.

So I left my job and it was kinda like, oh, what kinda job can I get right now that will actually allow me to go when I'm here and there. So, yeah, it's kinda a (unintelligible) because since (unintelligble) we all kinda had to be like "oh shit, what are we going to do for work, um..." Scrambling to get our stuff together, and things that don't have to do with the band. Um. So yeah, it was a stressful situation back then, but yeah ... two years.

Yeah.

Or three years, I guess.

So you guys recorded the record, and it took how long to come out, like a year you said?

Yeah, I think we, we recorded part of it last September, and then we recorded the rest of it in November of last year. Also, one of the two sound engineers that we were working with kind of - he was very busy and he also had a day job so he didn't have a lot of time to like, finish with us. After we had started we were just kicking around for a few months waiting for him to have another day, or weekend for him to hang out with us to mix it. So yeah, and of course Kill Rock Stars took six months to, do whatever they do with it.

Do you guys have any more material for another record or are you guys not thinking about that right now?

Um, y'know, we've been getting, to, luckily jam around at sound check and stuff like that. Like I said, it's been really amazing to get to play together, so we've been kinda writing stuff on this trip. Um, definitely not a new album's worth, but, um, but like it will still be just sort of a time to play together, which is good. Definitely thinking about trying to record again, and getting the ball rolling a little more.

That's cool. Um. Were there any new - for this record were there any newer influences than from your first two records, either musically, or cinematically or whatever?

Um, well, I will say that, I dunno, in the last three years, I think that my lyric writing has changed and gotten a little more overt and direct. When I - I used to be a little more into kinda abstract poetry. Uh, but I think just like, [something] person whose conscious and reads, y'know the newspaper should get sad about the state of the world. I think I would describe just, um, our day and age, politically and culturally as major influences on the band. Other than, musically, we're all over the place with what each of the three of us are into, and listen to, but we always have been. Y'know? Like, they aren't really into, like, Willie Nelson and Dolly Parton, and I've never really liked, um, post-punk? (laughs) We're still all over the place with that stuff. Like, y'know, um, I think we're just more, like, impassioned by the state of world.

Okay, well that's a good -

I mean, I wish I could get more of an - oh, wait, do you need me to hang on?

No, I was just going to say, that's a good segue into my next question.

Oh, okay.

But uh, do you feel there's, like, i mean - i didn't know how to phrase this question so i'm just going to have it both ways I have in my notes. Do you guys feel that there's been a drop-off in politically minded records in the last few years, or that there should be more of them given the Bush administration and the assault on civil liberties and, y'know, everything global that's happening?

Um, you know I'm not sure whether or not there's been a drop-off in politically minded records so much as that I know some bands that I used to think of as political bands. I actually don't want to name names because some of them are friends of mine.

Sure.

But I used to think of them as very political bands. I have used to listen to there more recent records, and they seem more pop-focused, y'know like lyrically. Um, and I used to think, "wow, this is so political, this is so feminist, this is so such and such." And then they kind of came out with, um, you know, "maybe we should get this out on MTV!" or "we're just talking about love here!" (laughs) y'know. And, I kind of have to say that I've been [unsure, pissed? disappointed and it got cut off? can't tell] to say that because I don't think that the world needs fewer feminist or anti-racist songs. I don't think the world needs fewer anti-corporate songs, or anti-surveillance songs, or domestic spying songs. I think that the more we raise consciousness about that, the more we speak out about that, the more empowered we can feel and the empowered other people can feel and just that they're connecting with other people who are feeling. But you know, I can't - I would never be like "oh you guys should write this," because in reality like, if you're an artist you need to do whatever art you want to do, and that's the point. So, I would have to say, that even though maybe I've been disappointed, I really don't think that people should be doing anything other than what they want to do.

Okay. Uh-

Like, if I were to sit down and write, you know, love songs, which I do sometimes, but it's not necessarily something I take out to the public, because I don't think it's as important. But that's my prerrogative as an artist, you know?

Well that's a fair answer. Have you guys ever encountered any hostility because you were an explicitly political band, or explicitly feminist, or any -

I'm sorry, I missed that.

Have you guys ever encountered any hostility from crowds, or have you gotten any hate mail or stuff because of the things you were saying, or because you were explicitly feminist or, anything else.

Um, no, not really. I do think, we've had some ... like when I do some interviews and stuff people always tell me that they thought that my lyrics were paranoid.

Really!

Things like that, which is, y'know, whatever. I really haven't encountered any kind of hostility, no. No. I think that we, um, you know the kind of places we're playing and, especially since we live in San Francisco where people are, you know, fairly politically aware and stuff, that people are open to allowing people to express themselves, y'know.

Mmhmm. Okay. What exactly prompted you to write "Another Genius Idea from our Government?" Like, it seems like that song is about something specific, and I was wondering if you had read an article or something like that, that prompted you to write that song.

Well. Y'know, it wasn't any particular article. I think that, y'know, I love science, and I read a lot of like, Discover Magazine, or Popular Science, and I get all of those every month. I'm really fascinated by that, my dad was a scientist. Uh, and definitely in the last year there's been a lot of scientific innovation in surveillance. And also just in, um, in the health realm, if you can afford to have certain air filters or something ... or um, can you hold on one second?

Of course.

[Pause] Okay, sorry, but definitely the innovations in microphones, videocameras, stuff like that. And also, reading about a lot of towns in the U.S. that are installing cameras on every corner; neighborhoods that are putting camreas up where everyone who lives in the neighborhood can go to a website and watch their neighborhood from inside their houses. This has been going on in the US and the UK both a lot. And just kinda, prompted by that kind of information; definitely not one particular thing, but just over time being like, "man."

Yeah.

Y'know, this is so kind of this Orwellian or this Aldous Huxley reality.

Yeah, well, uh, yeah you said before that your lyrics were getting a lot more explicit, and that's something that struck me as being a lot more explicit, than, I don't know, "How to Tell Yourself from a Television" or something. Even the name of the song is kind of obviously about something.

Yeah, it was just thinking about people going without health care, and all of this money that's spent on things other than taking care of citizens. And that's, that's "citizens" as opposed to "poor."

Mmm hmm. (Pause) I don't know if I would really, like - you were talking about love songs earlier on, or, yeah, but I don't know if I would really characterize "Take You" as a love song, um, but it kinda seems like it is. Do you -

Yeah, I think it is. Well, it's more of a friend song, but yeah. Yeah it's a little fluffier than some of the other stuff.

Um is there - and feel free to not answer this if you want to leave it more open to interpretation - but is there anything that the cave symbolizes to you?

Well, The Cave is actually where I live.

Oh, really?

That's the name of the house where I live.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. And it's a really special place where I feel like [something] for amazing San Francisco artists and musicians. I have ten roommates.

Wow.

And it's kind of far away, it's not in any of the hip neighborhoods. It's kind of far out in the shipyards. It's kind of secluded and it feels kind of nice, and [I really can't make out the rest of what she's saying.]

Mr. Beast

2006-03-17T03:44:00.000-08:00

Wow. Almost a month. Real dilligent. Well, it's almost April now, and this is the point where one's best intentions go awry and the beast within again laughs triumphant.

The "Mr. Beast" within, that is. Muahahaha.

I must dutifully apologize. Depression has been nipping at my neck in the past month or so, and it doesn't help that my writing is, really, a putrescent mountain of garbage. I would link you to my Mogwai review if I hated you, or I never wanted you to talk to me again. I gave it a 79 and opined that it was transitional, but still pretty damn great (a lot of people think I low-balled the score, and just as many think I inflated it. I say, live with the record a few more months and then come back to me).

A while ago I wrote about depression and the creative impulse, and I argued that the two are irreconcilable. This long, hard look in the face of writer's block (where you always keep writing, no matter how unreadable or mediocre the results) reminds me of that. When I'm depressed it's as if I'm fighting against myself, and to write well you need to have some idea of the home truth, whether it's about alienation or the new Band of Horses record. I don't think it can be done if one is constantly divided, if there's a mind warring against itself when it comes to the truth. So everything comes out jumbled and confused, fitting since my own internal monologue on everything from the meaning of love to what time I want to go to bed is jumbled and confused.

But goddamn. Sometimes you chip away and you chip away, and suddenly, you can see the spark, always somewhere you never expected, entirely accidental. And you follow that light, and then there's heat and then the work starts to go well. When the work starts to go well, man, you can't beat it with a fucking stick, because today or this hour or for five minutes it was you vs. the disease and you won. It's 1956 in Brooklyn, it's 2004 in Boston. You feel one hundred percent better: you feel like a person.

Sometimes. Mostly, though, you're scraping against metal, and you know enough that you should dig somewhere else, but your brain won't send the message to your hands.

I wrote in that article that the radical left has a tendency to absorb depression and mental illness in the narrative of resistance - it's only natural in this hellish post-modern ultra-convenient life where nothing has substance or meaning. I thought at the time that line of thinking sells the disease - and people with depression, namely me - short. The fact that I have a distorted self-image probably won't change with the revolution - it's something that I'm born with, like a sense of humor or a basic talent. Certainly it can develop or change over time, and maybe outside influnce has some effect on shaping or suppressing it, but it's always there and always will be.

I still think that, but I also want to amend it slightly, because depression is also a response to stimuli. People who aren't necessarily depressives can become seriously depressed in extraordinary circumstances, such as grieving the sudden loss of a close loved one. Seasonal Affective Disorder is awfully prevalent in the Northwest, doubtlessly because there is SO much rain ALL the time. Depressives, likewise, may also be fine until they are forced to respond to stress. The clues are in the severity of depression.

I still have three more hours of work and my energy level just drained completely.

For Bak

2006-02-22T03:17:00.000-08:00

Yeah, yeah. Two posts in the span of a month (a short month at that) is hardly the stuff of riveting reading (I'm going to pretend I don't notice how awful that alliteration is), I agree. Tonight's post comes only after protestation from partner in dreary-city internet music Cool Hand Bak, which sometimes I like to say is Bak, like Bok Choy. Only I don't think CHB is edible. I'll ask him if and when I think of it.

Really this should wait until tomorrow, because I now have in my urine-odored hands Bitter Tea, but I have not, as of yet, listened to it. Boogz of CMG fame says it sounds like Joan Baez playing Nintendo, which wasn't a compliment. I'm not listening to him. The Fiery Furnaces are the one band I am desperate to cover at Cokemachine and won't really get a chance to (besides the new year's article taking a thwack at the pinata everyone's had their turn to bust and steal the candy that is Rehearsing my Choir). I'm really excited to listen to it.

I also am evidently the only Cokemachineglow writer completely enthralled with the new Quasi album. Some are of the unreasonable belief that new Quasi albums are one step further than Sleater-Kinney albums, which is preposterous, and should be looked at as one more chance to hear Janet Weiss beat her drumset into bloody submission (which she does gloriously on When Things Get Dark). Granted, everyone is (rightly) impressed by the new Destroyer album and may have their vision obscured by its sun. I'm perfectly content with The New Pornographers' place in my musical constellation: a great and mighty planet observed once, perhaps twice in a calendar year when it happens to fall into plain sight. Reliably great, but kind of uninteresting. But I'd be lying if I told you I was familiar with Dan Bejar's work at all, so critical shorthand like "a distillation of all of his previous work" or "Bejar's growth as a vocalist really shines here" doesn't quite register with me. What I can tell you is that the album rules, flowers after repeated listenings, and is an early favorite for top ten record of the year.

The Akron/Family show in Olympia on Feb. 9 was one of the best I'd been to in a long time. Much as I love their long player, I like their half of the split with Angels of Light a lot more, and thankfully the night mostly featured the cacophony of in-jokes, Led Zeppelin riffs and general tomfoolery of that record. They've developed this frighteningly weird telepathy on stage that really has to be seen to be understood. The band harmonized the word "hot-pocket" for five minutes. This gave way to ironic half starts and insouciance before blaring, all pistons firing, into the Sonic Youth noise jam that opens "Moment." One got the impression that it was them vs. the crowd, with Akron having no compulsion against running roughshod over us. I report that we immediately and cheerfully capitulated. Norfolk and Western opened, and they sound nothing like AkAk, but they're good too.

I'm very tired and am now anxious to hear Bitter Tea. Downloads and stuff when I damn well feel like it.

Read this

2006-02-03T10:15:00.000-08:00

My best friend and I are arguing the (de)merits of band image, a subject on which I am approximately eight zillion minds, and I'm tired and can't really think straight. But, I read this scary fucking article with a stupid headline about Kansas' gonzo attorney general who is trying to compell abortion providers to give up information about teenagers having abortions, under the rubric that all sex under the age of eighteen is considered abuse. Here's the rub:

"Finally, Kline takes the not-illogical position that since all consensual teen sex is criminal, all teen abortion records provide vital evidence of that crime. Why, then, doesn't he subpoena all hospital records for evidence of all teen births? Is it possible that he is less interested in pursuing the real crime of teen sex than the non-crime of abortion? In two and a half years Kline's sweeping assertion that all health-care providers must report all teen intimate activity has morphed into demands for reports of consensual teenage sex that result in abortions. Which leads to the conclusion that the Kansas reporting law isn't intended to increase reports of child abuse, but to increase reports of teen sex—specifically from abortion providers. Which means that this law—along with Kline's attempts to subpoena state abortion records and force Kansas doctors performing abortions on girls under 14 to preserve fetal tissue—is part of the attorney general's single-minded use of his vast authority in the sole interest of hassling Kansas' abortion providers."

Full thing here

Open letter to 2005

2006-01-18T01:31:00.000-08:00

Dear 2005,

Knock it off. I've been done with you for eighteen days. I have a write-up for Cat Power to think about. Quit pestering me with all of these great records that I didn't listen to until now. I've made my top thirty already. Who even listens to thirty records in a year? This is ridiculous. This isn't healthy. I want to see other people, and besides, technically you're dead.

Sincerely,
Christopher

PS: Could you've at least told me how fucking good Year of Glaciers by Laura Veirs was? A little post-it note, perhaps, like "Wolf Parade whatever, Laura Veirs holy shit?" I'm not getting any younger, and looking awfully foolish coming late to the party all of the time.

I'm not even going to bother uploading mp3s; I'm that mad over how good this album is. I'm just going to link to her myspace page and be done with it. What does it sound like? Kind of a more obvious Nina Nastasia; indie-folk alt-country. Her voice reminds me of Mirah - childlike, breathy, understated - but also more protean and less seductive. Great arrangements and great production. Just. Fuck.

LauraSpace MyVeirs
Purchase the album legally from Insound.com

He was the real King

2006-01-16T11:32:00.000-08:00

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was tremendous. He fought for civil rights and was jailed, beaten, subject to harassment and surveilance from the FBI (who attempted to break up his marriage), and murdered (likely by Law Enforcement) for it. This is the only federal holiday worth celebrating. Among the clutter of stamps, half-hour specials and commemorative postage stamps, it's easy to forget that the things he said were frightening to a racist and violent society, and they would bring the hammer down at every opprotunity. By the end of his life he would criticize the war on Vietnam, declare that "I have come to see that the greatest purveyor of violence and war is my own government," and bemoan that his dream "has often turned into nightmare," among the corpses of Medgar Evers and the Mississippi Three, and the dereliction of de-facto segregation.

How easy it is, too, to forget the movement behind the civil rights movement, to forget the Freedom Fighters and SNCC and Black Panthers and the hundreds of nameless, faceless people who gave their time and houses and what money they had to the cause, who may not've shared King's eloquence but always shared his passion.

Usually, it's very easy to forget that racism still persists, that this is a violent society and only incessant vigilance can stem the tides of both. However, four scant months after Hurricane Katrina and the loss of over 2,000 servicepeople in Iraq, I believe that this year it is, perhaps, more obvious. But perhaps not, as blindness is often a malady of those it serves to afflict.

One of my favorite quotes: "True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring."

Read King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail

Read his Adress to Clergy and Laity Concerned about Vietnam

Sometimes a Pony Gets Depressed

2006-01-15T02:01:00.000-08:00

A brief note about my job: while it does afford me plenty of down time and high speed internet, I work with people who can't feed, toilet or help themselves in any way. So when I do have to work, I really have to work. This one man in the house I work in, in addition to being developmentally disabled, is also paranoid-schizophrenic with violent tendencies. He occasionally targets some staff members for acting out and will refuse to let them help him. Right now, he's doing it to the entire night staff. This is what it looks like: he'll call for help, I'll come into his room and he'll say "NO" really loudly, give me the finger and try to throw things at me. Sometimes he'll try to kick me. I'm to respect his wishes, but I also need to try and get him the support he needs. I just left his room thirty minutes ago; I was in there for an hour convincing him to let me help him change his clothes/sheets after he wet his bed. He's still calling for help, with an occasional obscenity lobbed in my direction. This has been going on for over two weeks now.

In other words, these aren't exactly ideal conditions to blog. (Incidentally, I get paid $8.10/hr. for this. I have a college degree, too. And debt.)

I have livejournal for all this; tonight I want to talk about my new favorite song. But the problem with being inundated by this kind of work and trying to keep tabs on indie rock is that by the time I discover an amazing album/band/song, everyone already knows about it. So it is with "Sometimes a Pony Gets Depressed," from The Silver Jews' most recent album. Truthfully, I hadn't heard the Jews prior to writing for the Machine; although Tanglewood Numbers received the endorsement of the usually reliable P. Hepburn, I started from the back forward, wearing out Starlight Walker (especially "Advice to the Graduate;" key line: "on the last day of your life/don't forget to die") on Winamp before I got to the new one.

What strikes me about this song is is its heavy resemblance to Warren Zevon, iin terms of Dave Berman's voice and in terms of composition. The lyric is a zoological alegory of alienation and depression, but its so understated, it's practically not even there: "Where does an animal sleep when the ground is wet?/cows in the ballroom, chickens in the farmer's corvette/sometimes a pony gets depressed/how does an animal sleep when the sun is set?/bandits in the capital limiting civilian unrest/sometimes a pony gets depressed." We get a clear picture of alienation and withdrawal (right down to the detached lyrical approach), but it's also sarcastic and hilarious, like much of Zevon's best work ("Desperados Under the Eaves," "Detox Mansion"). It's all delivered, like Zevon would do, over curious musical accompaniment - a double-time jaunt in a major key (though it's unlikely that Zevon's Mellow Mafia buddies could do anything approaching what Stephen Malkmus does on this track).

And away we go:

Download "Sometimes a Pony Gets Depressed" by The Silver Jews.
Purchase the album from Drag City Records.

Alito bit of Mary, all night long

2006-01-13T05:25:00.000-08:00

I had an hour or so to kill before work this evening, and so I headed over to the domicile of my good friend Bak. Him, his partner and myself had our ass kicked by the new Mendoza Line and solved the abortion debate. All it took was an hour and three people.

We also discussed this photo. Look carefully:

Seems like an assload of supporters, right? Well go ahead and count the supporters. There really aren't that many in the picture, maybe thirty tops. But this photo conveys powerful support: they're all holding signs in bright primary colors, neatly obscuring the fact that their ranks are one deep. There's also some technical sleight of hand going on here, a little bit of wide-angle distortion that makes everything look crammed in. It's tempting to blame the Times (who may've indeed cropped the photo), but as an erstwhile activist I can tell you that there's a few tricks to getting the camera to lie for you, like dressing in one solid color and making sure everyone holds a sign. Imagery is powerful, and we can see why here.

(Also, I think some of these people are related. Check the guy on the far left and then the one holding the "Sam's Club" sign.)

My take on the Alito matter is that the Democrats are clinically insane if they don't fillibuster. If the American public is going to have to swallow this shit, then the least they can do is go down swinging. The absolutely worst thing that could happen is that Alito would get confirmed, something that's likely to happen anyway. The fillibuster calls Frist on the "nuclear-option" bluff, and it makes the opposition look like they actually oppose something rather than hollow posturing. If the Republicans do go nuclear, then they're overreacting and it plays into the Democrats' hands; if they don't, they appear weak with their ultra macho base. This isn't so much about Alito as much as it's a scrimmage for November '06, and the gloves need to come off. The timing couldn't possibly be better with the Republican leadership on the ropes and Bush's popularity as low as it is.

This is of course in my fantasy world where the Democratic Party is serious about the concerns of progressive causes and would do something more than apply lube to the fist fucking the Bush administration is applying. But I wouldn't mind being proven wrong.

(PS I'm sorry for linking what is arguably my worst submission yet for the Machine, so I'm adding a link to The Mendoza Line's "Catch a Collapsing Star," possibly the best song on the new record. I like this because one) the melody is insane, a sweetly lulling thing that's nonetheless frazzled and poised to cause serious damage, and two) the opening line "On the margins and divisions where we both first made our living" reminds me of being in New Jersey ska bands and being happy when eight people came to our shows. Without further adieu:

The Mendoza Line - Catch a Collapsing Star.mp3

Two records

2006-01-04T01:45:00.000-08:00

Okay, so as a bona fide inaugural post I'm going to write about a couple of overlooked records from the last calendar year, with links to MP3s and allathat. Away we go:

1. Eluvium - Talk Amongst the Trees (Temporary Residence Ltd)

I feel like I'm cheating here; not only did I write the review for Cokemachineglow (where it's number sixteen in our year-end fifty) and interview Matthew Cooper, but this record wound up as number 27 in Stylus Magazine's top 50 and was praised wherever it was reviewed. So not only has a lot been written about this record, I've done a lot of it. Still, this album deserves as many words as we can throw at it, and since ambient music hardly ever gets this kind of attention, I'm willing to look the other way from myself.

Cooper has already done two great records under the Eluvium name; what's striking about Talk Amongst the Trees is its compositional elegance. Specifically, he marries superb minimalist musical composition - the chord changes are simple, ascending and descending, always loaded with the promise of resolve - with superb tonal composition as well. He gives his songs plenty of room to breathe to stack the whirring tape loops and echo plates that are the stock and trade of ambient. The song presented here, "New Animals from the Air," progresses like weather: a simple, freely played minor chord ascension gently propels looped sounds along like clouds floating on a jetstream. It's so effortless, understated and beautiful that you don't mind it goes by ten minutes without so much as a melody or dynamic shift.

New Animals from the Air [Edited Version]
Buy this album from Insound

2. The Knitters - The Modern Sounds of the Knitters (Zoe Records)

The Knitters, for those of you who don't know, are X thinly disguised as a roots-country band. X are one of my favorite bands (providing the name for this blog), and although their reunion has produced a great live album, guitarist Billy Zoom has pretty much openly admitted to being in it for the cash. This album is probably our best shot at a new X record, so it's a good thing it rules: The Modern Sounds of The Knitters is a fun and deftly performed slide of Americana, showcasing Appalachian standards and the ocassional X cover. (Wish the same can be said for John Doe's Forever Hasn't Happened Yet, which, despite "Hwy 5," a great song co-written by Exene Cervenka, is s'okay.) The first Knitters album was released at the same time as Ain't Love Grand!, X's naked attempt at chart success and unsurprisingly their worst record. Modern Sounds rescues "Burning House of Love" from the shlock-rock production of Michael Wagener (he of Shout at the Devil! fame. Yeah) and exposes the angry, kind-0f menacing regret at the song's core.

(In August I got to see The Knitters at The Showbox in Seattle. It was easily the best show of the year (in a year that included The Evens and The Mountain Goats), and it was interesting to see that most of the audience was there because of guitarist Dave Alvin's success with his American Music album. Which made us the youngest people there at twenty-four, which is a refreshing change of pace.)

Download "Burning House of Love."
Buy the record from X's homepage.

2006-01-03T12:53:00.000-08:00

I should never make New Year's resolutions. Here is an excellent example: I decided I was going to get serious about this newfangled interweb thing, and start this new blog off right with some musings on the past year, maybe even a list of the fifty best records ("50 in '05." Maybe it's not so clever). So it's January 3rd, so what have I done so far? I've slept, I've hung out with my girlfriend, and I've been away from my computer. I rule.

So odds are that if you have this link, you already know who I am and why I want to make this blog. So indulge me: my name is Christopher, I write reviews for www.cokemachineglow.com, I'm trying to break into this music-journalism thing and it's going kind of slow. I graduated last year from The Evergreen State College in sunshiny Olympia, WA. My focus was in Journalsim, and I was a coordinator for the A&E Section, but my program for last year was attendance and curriculum optional. It's a recipe for bullshit, I agree. Right now I do supported living for people with Developmental Disabilities. I do the night shift, which affords me plenty of time on the nerd and with books and things. It also means I never really get a lot of sleep, which like as not affects my prose (as it is no doubt doing this afternoon).

Nominally I perform and record songs under the name of The Inertia. Ask me about this again in a month or so, though. I used to play in various ska and bad alt-rock bands when I lived in New Jersey.

I am now very late to pick up my partner from school, and must go.

It's Kiss or Kill

2005-12-28T07:01:00.000-08:00

Some people give me the creeps.